A viatical settlement is the sale of a life insurance policy by the policy owner before the policy matures. Such a sale, at a price discounted from the face amount of the policy but usually in excess of the premiums paid or current cash surrender value, provides the seller an immediate cash settlement. Similar to reverse mortgages, viatical settlements involve insured individuals with a life expectancy of less than five years. In countries with high health care costs (such as the United States), this is a practical way to pay extremely high health insurance premiums and other senior care expenses that severely ill people face. Some people are also familiar with life settlements, which are similar transactions but involve insureds with longer life expectancies (two to fifteen years). - From Wikipedia and other sources 5/2007Linwood Manor Finds That OAP's are Hitting the Bottle in Retirement
London (PRWEB) March 17, 2008 -- Recent research by Linwood Manor suggests that It's not just young people feeling the effects of alcohol abuse but the older generation as well.
The UK youth culture of binge-drinking is rarely out of the headlines these days. However, a worrying trend of alcohol abuse within the older generation has been noticed by specialists at the Linwood Group, one of the UK's leading providers of alcohol addiction treatment.
They are seeing increasing number of men and women in their sixties, seventies and even in their eighties being admitted for alcohol detox and ongoing treatment at their four dedicated alcohol clinics.
Director of Linwood and leading addiction therapist, Sue Allchurch, explains why she feels this is happening: "Many people find retirement difficult to cope with. We grow up in a culture where work dominates everything and few are lucky enough to have a consuming passion or pastime to accompany them into retirement.
"Likewise, families these days are scattered across the country, even the world, so are not part of everyday life for many when they retire."
"Combine boredom, loneliness and the worry of getting older and you have the perfect formula for someone to turn to drink. Those people with a propensity towards alcoholism, which did not emerge during their working life, can find themselves progressing into dependency very quickly".
What's more, it can be harder to spot the symptoms of alcohol abuse in older people, because uncharacteristic behaviour, memory lapses, mood swings, clumsiness and feeling 'under the weather' are often dismissed as the more general symptoms of advancing age.
But alcohol dependence (http://www.lynwodemanor.co.uk/) is just as serious a problem for the elderly as it is the young, says Sue Allchurch: "We're often asked whether it matters so much if someone older becomes alcohol dependent, when the truth is that drinking out of control can rapidly spiral in a matter of months, potentially leading to premature death through a drink-related disease or accident."
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